Summer Edition: Collaboration

Welcome to our editorial newsletter where we highlight all the articles, interviews and features we’ve published this month.

If you’re new here, I’m Carissa, founder of The Subtext. I usually save these personal reflections for my Open Tabs newsletter. But this one hit close to home. Consider this a crossover joint.

Collaboration happens in many forms. When I worked in-house many moons ago, I loved collaborating with my creative team but struggled with cross-department relationships. I was a young writer who thought the marketing team had no balls and the CRM team was out to sabotage my good ideas. When I went agency-side, I had to grow up quick and learn the art of client management and rapport building. I learned when to push, when to suck up, and when to wave the white flag and let the CD sort it out. When I started my own studio, I teamed up with my work wife because our chemistry was already forged in the agency trenches. We didn’t know what we were doing but we had each other. And nearly a decade later, I’m still working out the kinks of this thing called collaboration with my current team, freelancers, clients, hell, even my CPA is a relationship that takes time to build.

Just this past month, I quit a project on Day 1 after I met the CEO and knew I couldn’t stomach working for another Silicon Valley egomaniac. I ate the cost of the flight and time spent leading a full-day kickoff session. And just last week, I got fired from a project I worked tirelessly on, but knew from the jump it was a bad fit. I ignored my gut and barreled forward bullishly, assuming I’d work it out, as I had countless times before. That choice cost me my sanity, shook my confidence and left me feeling like it was time to ceremoniously heave my laptop in the Atlantic and fulfill my dream of becoming a full-time dog walker. Dramatics aside, the past few months have felt like a crash course in expert collaboration. Which is a polished word for a very messy, highly variable act that you never stop learning or mastering.

Which is probably why this month’s submissions resonated so much with me. Rather than celebrating collaboration as some magical superpower, they explore what it looks and feels like in practice. A creative matchmaker talks about the value of chemistry in agency work, a ghostwriter tells us what it’s really like collaborating on other people’s ideas, a motion designer talks about the impactful combo of motion and message, and our very own project manager writes about being the collaborative glue within the creative process, connecting people, tasks, and priorities.

Here's to the beautifully imperfect business of making things together.

Ryan Crown, Creative Director at Crown Creative

A conversation with Crown Creative’s Ryan Crown about how his team made nine unique food and beverage destinations at one Dominican Republic resort feel like family. READ

Jodi Lipper, Ghostwriter & Author

You know celebrities don’t write their own books, right? New York Times bestselling author Jodi Lipper explains how she’s thrived in the collaborative writing world for over twenty years. READ

Naming Names
By Tom Heesom

Get a look inside how some of the world’s most recognizable brand names came to be from the Director of Strategy at Kurppa Hosk. Tom also gives us tools to create some of our own.

Brand Meet Agency. Agency Meet Brand.
By Nick Bell

Nick Bell is a matchmaker of a different kind. His insightful pairing of brands with agencies isn’t as much about resumes as it is about instinct. He argues, you can’t fake chemistry. And he would know after introducing 2,000 brands to agencies through his work with Ask Us For Ideas.

How Motion Brings Brand Stories to Life
By Andrew Vucko

Andrew is a motion designer who imagines body language and movement through copy and design. Here, he makes a compelling case for working in tandem rather than apart in order to achieve three-dimensional impact.

Not the Soloist
By Caroline Gregory

Project Managers are the foundation of every well-run agency or team, just as the bass is the bedrock of every successful orchestra. Our very own project manager delivers an ode to the unsung efforts of the non-creatives in creative work. P.S. Send this to the PM in your life : )

The Practice of Paying Attention
By Sharchar Ayon

What happens when we look rather than click for ideas and inspiration? What happens when we engage more meaningfully with the outside world? Creative director and brand strategist Sharchar challenges us to look beyond our algorithm.

UP NEXT

The Subtext is taking a bit of a break this summer, with some “best of’s” rather than “new drops”. We’re culling our archives for stand-out quotes, tips and techniques to keep your brain from melting entirely in the summer heat. Come September, we’ll be back with a bang.

In the meantime, don’t be a stranger. Drop us a line if you have an idea, have new work you’d like to feature, or just want to say ‘sup. The inbox is always open.